More than 160 airmen from eight of the US Air National Guard’s nine aeromedical evacuation squadrons participated in a Guard-wide training event hosted by the 137th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron (AES) at Will Rogers Air National Guard Base, Oklahoma City, this April. The event, known as the Multiple Aircraft Training Opportunity Program (MATOP) allows the units to work together and share techniques while also working across all the airframes that aeromedical air crews frequently come into contact with.

Maj. Casey Patton, 137 AES operations officer and primary MATOP planner, explained: “The purpose of MATOP is to bring the aeromedical squadrons together to accomplish integrated training with three primary aircraft – the C-130 Hercules, KC-135 Stratotanker and C-17 Globemaster III – on the ground and in flight. It gives us an opportunity to apply the event’s takeaways, exchange knowledge, and unify and create a single aeromedical field. This way, we’re able to think the same way, and do the same things.”

Master Sgt. Yvonne Payne, 137 AES flight medical technician and MATOP planner, added: “Bringing all of the aircraft here and bringing all of the units here allows them to see the aircraft, train on the aircraft, configure, load, compete and run scenarios on the aircraft. Throughout the year, we’re required so many medical scenarios, and flying helps us fulfil those requirements, even if it’s just finding the fire extinguisher on a specific airframe. Then, when we deploy, we know it already.”

During the event, airmen loaded and secured patients and equipment before each flight, adapting to the different set-ups of each plane. During flight, they had to work their way through a number of scenarios, including patient treatment, in-flight fires or rapid decompression, medical emergencies and even equipment malfunctions, said the Guard. On the ground, the event required Airmen in communications, radio, logistics, administration and biomedical fields to remain on their toes while in a simulated deployed environment.

First-time MATOP participant Senior Airman Jennifer Cleveland, a medical logistics airman from the 142nd AES, Delaware Air National Guard, commented: “As a logistics airman, there aren’t many opportunities for us to see what our role in a deployment location would be like. I think it’s really important that we’re exposed to that environment, and we’re working side-by-side with [medical] logistics airmen from other units.”

On the ground, the airmen’s medical knowledge and abilities were tested in timed scavenger hunts, relays and obstacle courses that combined teamwork with quick thinking.

This year’s MATOP followed previous iterations in 2012 and 2016. After the installation of a static C-130 trainer at Will Rogers Air National Guard Base last year, the 137 AES has made MATOP an annual priority, said the Guard.

“We’d like to continue with this type of training, but also expand it to incorporate additional training scenarios to make it more complex,” said Patton. “This year, we built on last year’s event to enhance the experience of our ground training and add more ground personnel. We doubled the amount of training this year, and next year we hope to add even more.”